Posts Tagged ‘Renault-Nissan Alliance’

Renault-Nissan Chief Carlos Ghosn has said that partnerships are likely in the coming age of the connected car.

Under Carlos Ghosn, the Nissan-Renault alliance has leaned forward in areas such as the development and sales of electric cars and autonomous vehicle technology even when the returns have been scant.

Ghosn, however, also has been open to alliances of various kinds and Ogi Redzic, the executive overseeing connected vehicles at Nissan and Renault, said this week that developing a common technology for connectivity outweighs the risks of from a possible defect or a common breach in cyber security.

News Now!

Redzic, senior vice president of the Renault-Nissan Alliance, said for automakers, connectivity with links to family, navigation aids and remote control of vehicles is an area where all automakers are looking for an edge. (more…)

Already one of the most successful partnerships in automotive history, the Renault-Nissan Alliance is targeting an additional $6 billion in new “synergies” by 2018, the two carmakers announced Friday.

The plan comes as something of a victory lap for Carlos Ghosn, the Brazilian-born executive who serves as CEO of the two companies. Late last year, he beat back a push by the French government, a major investor in Renault, which threatened to fracture the Euro-Asian alliance.

Subscribe Now!

“The auto industry is rapidly evolving, requiring Renault and Nissan to leverage the Alliance as a pragmatic business tool,” said Ghosn in a prepared statement.

Mercedes and Nissan are teaming to produce a new luxury truck for the German automaker. The Frontier is likely the basis for the truck.

The Renault-Nissan Alliance and Daimler AG plans to expand their five-year strategic cooperation into the pickup truck segment.

The two automakers plan to develop a 1-ton pickup truck for Mercedes-Benz.

Your Auto News Source!

Mercedes-Benz announced late last month it planned to develop a luxury pickup truck and indicated the project would be put on the fast track. The alliance with Renault-Nissan opens the door to moving the project forward, according to Daimler Chief Executive Officer Dieter Zetsche, who indicated last week in Berlin the new pickup truck would be ready before the end of the decade. (more…)

Announcing the biggest project in their four-year-old alliance, Daimler AG and Nissan Motor Co. have confirmed they will jointly set up and operate a new luxury car plant in central Mexico. At a cost of 1 billion Euros, or close to $1.4 billion, it will begin operating by 2017, the makers’ two CEOs revealed during a joint news conference.

There will be two separate lines, one for each brand, at the new luxury car plant – which will be erected on a portion of the new factory complex Nissan opened in the city of Aguascalientes last November. The factory will eventually employ “nearly 5,700” workers and will have capacity to produce about 300,000 vehicles annually, said Daimler’s chief executive Dieter Zetsche and Nissan’s Carlos Ghosn.

Nissan opened up its Aguascalientes plant last year. But it left plenty of room to expand once it locked down its joint venture with Daimler's Mercedes-Benz.

Nissan Motor Co. and Daimler AG will announce a significant expansion of their four-year-old alliance this morning, the two partners planning to set up a new plant in Aguascaliente, Mexico that will produce small luxury cars for the Japanese maker’s Infiniti brand and the German manufacturer’s Mercedes-Benz.

The project, first reported last year by TheDetroitBureau.com, takes the three-way partnership between Daimler, Nissan and French automaker Renault to a significant new level. The maker’s initially agreed to jointly produce engines and, among other things, develop a small car platform to be used for both Daimler’s Smart brand and as a replacement for the little Renault Twingo. Just this week, a new Nissan plant in Decherd, Tennessee launched production of engines for both the Infiniti and Mercedes brands.

Your Global News Source!

The new luxury car plant will be set up alongside an existing assembly line Nissan opened in the central Mexican city of Aguascalientes next year. Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn and Daimler CEO Dieter Zetsche has previously both confirmed they were discussing the possibility of a new joint production facility but insiders say it took longer than expected to work out the details.

A day after launching the revival of the once-familiar Datsun brand, Nissan and its French partner Renault are laying out major plans for India and other emerging markets, including a plan to jointly develop a new line of ultra-low cost vehicles that the makers hope will give them a leg up in some of the world’s newest and fastest-growing markets.

Describing himself as “very bullish on India,” Carlos Ghosn, the CEO of both of the automotive partners, outlined plans to invest $5 billion on the subcontinent over the next few years, double what had previously been announced.

Outperform - With a Free Subscription!

Ghosn said that Nissan, Renault and the reborn Datsun brand and aiming for a 15% share of the Indian market. Between them, the partners could have as many as 15 to 20 different models in Indian showrooms within the next five years, they indicated.

Good news for CEO Carlos Ghosn - and the Renault-Nissan Alliance he heads.

The strategic partnership between Renault and Nissan has been credited with saving the once-foundering Japanese maker and, more recently, helping the French side of the alliance hold its own during the European economic crunch. Now, say the two makers, they achieved record “synergies” for the 2012 model-year.

By working together on everything from parts distribution to product development, the Renault-Nissan Alliance reports it generated 2.69 billion Euros in synergies last year, a 54% jump from the 1.75 billion achieved in 2012.

Charging Up Your Car Knowledge!

“Synergies and greater economies of scale allow Renault and Nissan to compete in an elite tier of the world’s top automakers globally,” said Christian Mardrus, Renault-Nissan Alliance Managing Director for Logistics and the Office of the CEO. “We expect to generate even more synergies going forward, particularly in emerging markets such as Brazil, Russia, India and China.”

A future version of Infiniti G IPL could deliver as much as 530 horsepower.

The already torrid relationship between Daimler AG and the Renault-Nissan Alliance continues to heat up. Daimler’s Mercedes-Benz brand is now expected to provide the underpinnings for the Euro-Asian alliance’s next-generation Infiniti G cars.

According to new reports, Infiniti will share the same platform as the next-generation Mercedes-Benz C-Class. The new model will be slightly larger than the current Infiniti G, and will be offered with more body and powertrain variations.

Your Auto Show Source!

That is expected to include a coupe and a sedan, while powertrain options are likely to offer buyers a hybrid, possibly a diesel, and even a 530-horsepower V-6, according to a report in Motor Trend magazine quoting Japanese sources.

Despite the economic problems in Europe and concerns about a double-dip recession in the U.S., the Euro-Asian Renault-Nissan Alliance set a sales record in 2011, collectively marketing a total 8.03 million vehicles around the world, including 4.67 million vehicles for Nissan, 2.72 million for Renault, and 638,000 for AvtoVAZ, their Russian partner.

The Alliance achieved a 10.3% increase in volume from the 7.28 million vehicles sold across the Alliance in calendar-year 2010 despite an unusually harsh year, in which the auto industry faced the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, the October flooding in Thailand, the abnormal strength of the yen and eurozone uncertainties.

In the Know!

“Partnerships are key to regional growth and a key reason the Alliance achieved a new sales record,” said Carlos Ghosn, the Brazilian-born executive who serves as CEO for both Nissan and Renault.

The Japanese side of the alliance was a particular stand-out considering the disasters in Japan and subsequent flooding in Thailand. In contrast to rivals Toyota and Honda, who struggled with product shortages until late in the year, Nissan was already nearing full-speed production by July. But it might not have gone so well.

The rapidly expanding partnership between Germany’s Daimler AG and the Euro-Asian Renault-Nissan Alliance will take another step forward when the partners begin production of a new line of 4-cylinder engines in the U.S. in 2014.

Nissan’s current powertrain plant, in Decherd, Tennessee will eventually be capable of producing as many as 250,000 engines annually for use in both Mercedes-Benz and Infiniti models. That factory, opened in 1997, already produces a mix of 4-, 6- and 8-cylinder engines for both the flagship Nissan and high-line Infiniti brands.

Your High-Powered News Source!

The decision to jointly produce engines in Decherd is the latest expansion of the Daimler/Nissan/Renault partnership initiated almost two years ago, and suggests that there may be further projects to come. When asked whether that might lead to a full-scale merger, Daimler CEO Dieter Zetsche said no, insisting the step-by-step strategy makes more sense for the three makers.

“We share the office and not the bed, and that works perfectly well,” Zetsche explained during a preview of the Detroit Auto Show.